Come on out next week for a night of Middle Eastern storytelling! I’ll be reading a new essay about my last name and how it relates to being Arab American and mixed. Plus, we’re going to dance the dubke! Details below:
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Mixed heritage
I’m Speaking at the #MixedRemixed Festival on Sat June 13!
I’m honored to have been chosen to be part of the panel entitled, “Writing the Mixed Experience Professionally.” I’ll do my best to represent as a mixed-heritage Arab American writer! Come join in on the fun!
Check out the website and register by clicking here.
Day and Time: June 13, 2015 from 10AM to 5:30PM — My panel’s from 11AM to 12:20PM.
Place: The Japanese American National Museum in Little Tokyo at 100 N Central Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90012.
Hope to see you there!
#RAWI Conference Kicks Off Friday Morning with My Presentation!
The Radius of Arab American Writers (RAWI) conference starts tomorrow in Minneapolis! I’m speaking on a panel Friday morning about Arab American identity. I had the honor of interviewing some heavy hitters: poet and author Naomi Shihab Nye, novelist and memoirist Diana Abu-Jaber, poet and essayist Lisa Suhair Majaj, playwright and actor Leila Buck, and writer and scholar Amira Jarmakani. I asked them why, as mixed-heritage Arab American woman who could “pass” as white, they instead choose to “flame” as Arab, boldly communicating their Arabic roots. (The language of the study, as the study itself, are works in progress as almost no one thinks that they “flame” — as one participant put it, is not hiding who you are the same as flaming?)
I found that their experiences show that identities are not static, they shape shift along with us and can serve as powerful tools to connect with broader communities for storytelling, activism and a sense-of-self.
Drop by at 9AM on Friday to hear all about it! (For those of you who won’t be at the conference, unfortunately, it won’t be streaming live on Skype just yet. Maybe next year. Email me for the cliff notes.)
P.S. Thanks to the A-B in my name I’m at the top of the list of presenters! Check it out here.
My paper’s been accepted for the Radius of Arab American Writers’ conference
RAWI, the Radius of Arab American Writers, Inc., is an organization for Arab American writers, scholars, and artists. RAWI conferences bring these usual suspects together to share ideas and words by day and to shake our booties by night. This year’s gathering will be held in September in partnership with Mizna, in Minneapolis, MN.
My paper, “Passing for White, Flaming as Arab,” has been accepted — FUN! Here’s the scoop: Many Arab American women writers are mixed-heritage, with one parent of white European descent and the other of Arab descent – myself included. Why, when many of us could “pass” as white, have we chosen to instead “flame” as Arabs, using signifiers to communicate our Arab heritage, in particular through our writing? I suspect the choice is both personal and political. To find out, I will interview a handful of AMAZING writers: Naomi Shihab Nye, Diana Abu-Jaber, Lisa Suhair Majaj, Leila Buck and Amira Jarmakani. I will also include myself in the study, referencing my essay “No Longer Just American” published in the anthology Nobody Passes: Rejecting the Rules of Gender and Conformity, in which I describe my own experience grappling with identity and choosing not to pass.
Here’s a pic with Leila Buck from the last conference I attended (in 2006) — before our silver streaks came in.
Stephanie Abraham 